John Wight writes that ‘no’ won in spite of itself but that makes it no easier for the pro-independence left to influence the SNP
The telling aspect of the most historic election in UK political history was not the unprecedented 85 percent turnout. Nor was it the achievement of the Yes campaign in mobilising and bringing thousands of people across Scotland into political engagement and activity. It was not even the resignation of SNP leader Alex Salmond the day after the election, which added a Shakespearean quality to what had already been a dramatic period in Scottish history.
The most telling event came in Manchester a couple of days after 18 September at the Labour Party conference, when a coach carrying representatives of Scottish Labour pulled up outside the conference to a rapturous welcome from Harriet Harman and various other Labour MPs and officials. Off the coach came Johann Lamont, Margaret Curran, and Anas Sarwar et al. with broad smiles and raised hands, basking in the kind of glory you would normally associate with a football team returning home after winning the World Cup.
Watching this it was clear that Labour in Scotland is as close to a political corpse than it has ever been in the wake of a referendum result which, rather than a victory, was a disaster for Labour, clear proof that the ideological hollowing out it went through during the Blair years has yet to be reversed.
Whereas we witnessed a Yes campaign that was testimony to the potential of a grassroots mobilisation in a mature democracy, the Better Together campaign qualified as one of the most inept and cynical ever waged. None who witnessed it will soon forget the sight of a Tory Prime Minister scurrying up to Scotland from London, accompanied by the leaders of the two mainstream Westminster opposition parties, in a panic stricken attempt to save the Union as the gap narrowed.
That we even got to this point is an indictment of Labour and evidence of the contempt in which it is now held within large swathes of traditional Labour heartlands in Glasgow, Dundee, West Dunbartonshire, North Lanarkshire etc. So bad is this political and ideological malaise that it fell to Respect MP George Galloway to step into the breach and make the case for ‘real’ Labour values as he toured the country with his ‘Just Say Naw’ campaign. Other notable exceptions to Labour’s dire performance were members of the Red Paper Collective, whose efforts were considerable given the lack of resources at their disposal and a wider platform from which to make their case for a class-based alternative to independence
The SNP’s prospectus was so full of holes you could have driven a bus through it. Rather than a significant departure from the status quo, it had status quo stamped all over it. Whether over the retention of sterling as the national currency (a disaster in the making for reasons by now well known); the retention of the Queen and heirs as head of state; NATO and EU membership; or a 3 percent cut in corporation tax, the SNP outlined a vision that could best be described as independence without independence. This is why I was confident of a ‘no’ vote up until the last two weeks, regardless of the deficiencies of the ‘no’ campaign.
But this is precisely the point where the idealism and hope fuelling the grassroots Yes campaign became a material force that bore no relation to the contents of the White Paper. It succeeded in marrying the Gramscian spirit of the 1968 student and workers revolt in France with the democratic insurgent qualities of he first presidential campaign of Barack Obama, and it appeared unstoppable. Driving down Leith Walk in Edinburgh a week ago the charged atmosphere is something I have never experienced in all my time in politics. I thought then that we were headed for a Yes vote and independence.
As for what comes next, the independence supporting Scottish left will do its utmost to capitalise on the momentum and energy unleashed by the Yes campaign. New parties, new alliances, and new possibilities will be discussed, debated, agreed and disagreed. If a realignment of the left emerges with independence as its core demand, it cannot afford to fall into the trap of failing to take on the SNP in the present over class issues surrounding policing, housing, taxation, and so on in service to the wider objective. If it does, if it cedes ground to the SNP, then the issue of class will be lost or parked in the cul-de-sac of nationalism. Dealing with the limitations of nationalism will pose a significant challenge for any new left formation that now emerges.
Whatever happens, Scotland’s political terrain has undergone a seismic shift and nothing will ever be the same. Those who fail to understand this and adapt accordingly are headed for political oblivion.
John Wight is a writer and political commentator